Multiple hook and pocket fastener



March 15, 1955 L. RosEMAN MULTIPLE HOOK AND POCKET FASTENER Filed March 12, 1952 I N V EN TOR. aff/7 ,s1/7,'

ATTORNEY nited States Fate MULTIPLE HOOK AND POCKET FASTENER Leo Roseman, Newark, N. J.

Application March 12, 1952, Serial No. 276,123

This invention relates in general to fasteners of the type including two sections one of which constitutes a pocket formed on the edge of a garment opening or on a strip of fabric while the other comprises a hook secured on the other edge of the garment opening or on another strip of fabric cooperating with and insertable into the pocket for connecting the two sections together. More particularly, the invention contemplates a fastener of this type especially suitable for use in garments such as corsets, brassires, shirts, and the like.

In certain garments, for example, corsets and girdles, the edges of openings in the garment are provided with slide fasteners for drawing said edges together or releasing them to close and open the corresponding garment openings, respectively, and auxiliary fasteners comprising hook and eye tapes in association with the slide fasteners for preliminarily securing said garment edges together preparatory to the closing operation of the slide fasteners. It is diicult, especially in tight tting garments, to connect the hooks to the eyes of the auxiliary fastener, particularly where the hooks and eyes are at the rear or side of the body where they cannot be seen or are visible only with diiculty. Therefore, one object of the invention is to provide a novel and improved fastener which can be utilized as an auxiliary fastener in place of said hook and eye fasteners beneath a slide fastener in a garment whereby the auxiliary fastener sections can be easily and quickly connected together and disconnected even where they are out of sight'of the wearer.

Hook and eye fasteners of the character above described are also bulky and require manipulation of the garment edges out of their own planes for connecting and disconnecting the hooks and eyes. Therefore, another object of the invention is to provide a fastener embodying novel and improved features of construction which shall overcome the above mentioned difn'culties and disadvantages, and shall be thin or have minimum bulk, shall have the complemental fastener elements, namely, hooks and pockets, connectable and disconnectable in the general plane of the garment edge, shall be flexible and easily operable and shall permit disconnection of all of the complemental fastener elements quickly at one time and in one simple relative movement of the two complemental sections of the fastener in the general plane and longitudinally of the strip or garment edges to which the fastener is attached.

Another object of the invention is to provide such a fastener which shall include two strips of fabric, one having flat hooks preferably formed of sheet metal and secured to the strip with the plane of the hooks in substantially the plane of the strip, while the other strip has a plurality of pockets to cooperate with said hooks and lying in substantially a common plane with the corresponding strip, the mouths or openings of all of the pockets facing in the same direction approximately parallel to the general plane of the corresponding strip so that the hooks can be slid along the strip into and out of the pockets.

A further object is to provide a fastener of this character wherein the strip shall be folded transversely upon itself and have the overlying portions secured together to form the pockets.

Still another object is to provide in such a fastener novel and improved means for guiding the hooks longitudinally of the pocket strip and into the pockets to facilitate the insertion of the hooks into the pockets.

Other objects are to provide a fastener of this character wherein the folds of the pocket strip shall be stitched together in a novel and improved manner so that the stitches provide abutments for the hooks and tend to restrain movement of the hooks out of the pockets when the fastener sections are connected and under tension.

Other objects, advantages and results of the invention will be brought out by the following description in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which Figure 1 is a fragmentary elevational View of a girdle having a slide fastener and an auxiliary hook and pocket fastener embodying the invention, the slide fastener and auxiliary fastener being shown in open position;

Figure 2 is a greatly enlarged fragmentary plan view of the auxiliary fastener showing portions of the two fastener sections connected together and other portions thereof separated;

Figure 3 is a greatly enlarged transverse vertical sectional view approximately on the plane of the line 3 3 of Figure 2;

Figure 4 is a horizontal sectional view approximately on the plane of the line 4-4 of Figure 2, the View being turned on the sheet;

Figure 5 is a horizontal sectional view approximately on the plane of the line 5-5 of Figure 2.

For the purpose of illustrating the principles of the invention, I have shown my fastener in connection with a corset A which has a longitudinal opening extending inwardly from the upper end of the garment to facilitate donning of the garment, and in accordance with the invention the edge portions B and C of this opening have secured thereto the respective slide fastener strip tapes D that have cooperating fastener elements secured along their edges and engageable and disengageable by a slider 2 for connecting and disconnecting respectively the edge portions of the garment to close and open the garment opening. This structure so far is old and well known.

The invention relates particularly to an auxiliary fastener comprising two sections E and F one of which is secured to each of said edge portions C and B of the garment beneath or inwardly of the corresponding Stringer tapes D, the section E having hook fastener elements 3 attached thereto to cooperate with pockets 4 in the other section F, for preliminarily drawing the garment edge portions together preparatory to the closing operation of the slider 2.

Each hook element is shown as comprising a at piece of sheet metal having a base portion 5 provided with a laterally projecting hook at one edge including a shank 6 projecting at approximately right angles from said edge and terminating in a bill 7 which may be either parallel to the edge of the base 5 or slightly inclined toward the base as shown in Figures l and 2, the latter construe tion tending to restrain accidental slipping of the hook portions from the complemental pockets, as will be hereinafter described, although tension upon the hook section and pocket section will restrain accidental disconnection of the fastener elements.

The hook fastener elements may be secured in position in any suitable manner, but as shown, the fastener section E includes a folded strip of fabric 8 comprising a plurality of plies which is secured to the edge portion C of the garment by lines of stitches 9 and 10 and the hook fastener elements are secured between the strip S and said garment edge portion with the shanks projecting therebeyond as best shown in Figures 2 and 5. Preferably another line of stitches 11 is provided for holding the bases 5 of the fastener elements between the lines of stitches 10 and 11; and preferably the base portions S of the hook fastener elements are slotted or of loop formation to receive o-set stitches 12. rThe stitches ll and 12 are shown as passing through only intermediate plies of the edge portion B of the garment and the strip 8, but olf. course said stitches could pass through all of the p ies.

The pocket section F is shown as comprising two superposed folded strips 13 and 14, one of which, in the present instance the strip 14, is secured to the corresponding edge portion C of the garment. The base strip 13 is shown as folded transversely upon itself as indicated at 15 in Figure 3 to provide a pocket one wall portion of which is formed by the main portion of the strip 13 while another wall is formed by the returned portion 16. The bottom of the pocket is formed by the fold 15, while the mouth 17 of the pocket is formed at the edge of the returned portion 16 and faces in a direction parallel to the general plane of the strip. The folded and returned portions of the strip are secured together along one edge of the strip 13 by a line of stitches 18 which includes off-set stitches 19 passlng through the returned portions or walls 16 at a point spaced inwardly from the edges of said walls and in spaced relation to the free edge of the strip 13. In spaced relation to the off-set stitches 19, the strip 14 overlies the returned or wall portions 16 and is secured to the base strip 13 by a longitudinal line of stitches 20. This line of stitches 20 is spaced inwardly from the folded edge of the strip 14 to form a narrow flap 21 against or beneath which the hook fastener elements may be slid during the operation of inserting them into the pockets, as will be hereinafter more fully described. It will be understood that the distance between the off-set stitches 19 and the stitches 20 will be just adequate to permit easy sliding of the bills of the hook fastener elements into the pockets and to restrain disconnection of the hooks from the pockets upon application and release of tension to and from the fastener sections as during movements of the body to which the fastener is applied. The off-set stitches 19 serve as abutments for the bills 7 of the hook fastener elements, and the inclination of the bills with respect to the bases S cause the bills to hook under the abutment stitches 19, as best shown in Figure 2, so as to restrain movement of the bills lengthwise out of the pockets when the fastener sections are under tension.

In operation of the fastener as described, after the garment has been applied to the body the two sections E and F will be pulled edgewise together and the bills of the hooks will be slipped into the respective pockets as shown in the lower portion of Figure 2. To facilitate and guide the insertion of the bills into the pockets, the bills may be pressed against or slipped under the flap 21 and then slid lengthwise of said ap until the hook bills enter the pockets, as shown in Figure where the hook and a portion of the hook section E are illustrated by dot and dash lines. This construction is especially advantageous where the fastener is invisible or can be seen only with ditliculty during the closing of the fastener, for example, when the fastener is at the rear or at one side of the garment. The strains applied to the fastener sections when they are connected are assumed by the off-set stitches 19 which cooperate with the inclined bills of the hooks to restrain accidental disconnection of the hooks from the pockets as above described. To separate the fastener sections, the hook bills can be easily pulled from the pockets, and if desired all the hooks can be pulled from all of the pockets at the same time by relatively longitudinally moving the two fastener sections, that s by pulling said sections or the two edge portions of the garment in opposite directions longitudinally thereof.

From the foregoing it will be seen that the inven- 4 tion provides a thin, at, edge-to-edge fastening together of the sections and that the hook fasteners easily can be connected to and disconnected from the pockets. Moreover, the hook fastener elements can be easily guided into the pockets and in conjunction with the abutment stitches 19 provide a strong and durable fastener.

While the now preferred embodiment of the invention has been shown and described it will be understood that this is primarily for the purpose of illustrating the principles of the invention and that the construction of the fastener sections may be widely modified and changed within the spirit and scope of the invention.

What I claim is:

1. A fastener comprising two approximately flat ilexible sections, the iirst section having a iiat hook element secured thereon with a hook bill disposed in a plane parallel to the general plane of said section and extending approximately in the same direction as one edge of said section, the second section comprising a strip of ilexible material having a fold perpendicular to one edge thereof providing a returned portion, a plurality of means spaced lengthwise of said fold and securing said returned portion to the main portion of the strip at spaced zones thereby forming a pocket between said means and between said returned portion and said main portion for said hook bill, the mouth of said pocket facing in the direction parallel to the general plane of the strip so that the hook bill can be slid along said strip and into said pocket, one of said securing means passing through and connecting said returned portion and said main portion adjacent said edge of the strip and providing an abutment in said pocket for said hook bill when the latter is inserted in said pocket.

2. A fastener as defined in claim 1 wherein one of said securing means comprises stitches offset from said edge of the strip.

3. A fastener as defined in claim 1 wherein at least one of said securing means comprises a line of stitches running longitudinally of said strip along said edge thereof, said line of stitches includes stitches offset inwardly of said edge and providing said abutment, and said hook bill is inclined with respect to the edge of said first section so as to engage behind said oifset stitches and restrain accidental disengagement of the hook from the pocket. 4. A fastener as defined in claim 1 wherein said securing means comprises parallel lines of stitches spaced from each other longitudinally of said fold one of which runs along said edge of the strip and has stitches offset inwardly of said edge and providing said abutment spaced from the other line of stitches a distance slightly greater than the width of the hook bill to permit easy sliding of the hook bill into said pocket and restrain accidental disconnection of the hook from the pocket.

References Cited in the le of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,083,047 Butow .lune 8, 1937 2,087,925 Roseman July 27. 1937 2,102,223 Roseman Dec. 14, 1937 2,255,713 Robbins Sept. 9, 1941 2,589,916 Wyner Mar. 18, 1952 

